look i'll say it again. you fought for our freedom if the action in which you were involved actually had the purpose and effect of freeing us or preserving what freedom we had. and if not, not. whatever they were fighting for in vietnam, it was not our freedom. whatever they are fighting for in iraq, it is not our freedom. for example, if the nation is manipulated by lies to go to war and start killing people, then what you're fighting/killing/dying for is lies and oppression. i guess maybe the idea is that all these people meant well, or were convinced by the government that they were fighting for our freeedom. but propaganda, self-delusion, and capitulation are not freedom. that everyone who ever served in the armed forces is an american hero is (a) ridiculous, and (b) precisely more manipulation to keep us killing. the fact that we all chorus these words in unison just shows how entirely manipulable we are, how desperately we want to do what they want us to do, no matter what it is.

every memorial day, you get the vague impression that the wars in vietnam and iraq, e.g., were a matter of repelling an invasion by the vietnamese or the iraqis, that america's heroes were defending the american heartland, that america would not exist at all if we hadn't killed those hundreds of thousands of people. freedom isn't free and the cost is high and america's veterans have preserved america for us so we could pass our freedom down to our children. think about that for like half a second with regard to these particular conflicts. it is an insanely ridiculous picture, more hyperbolically propagandistic even than the rhetoric of the vicious people who dragged your ass into these conflicts, or invented them out of whole cloth for political purposes etc. if you think the existence of our freedom required us to agent orange or napalm the fields around isolated villages in the vietnamese jungle etc, not to speak of the villages/villagers themselves, you are out of your bloodthirsty mind. if you think that the action was heroic, then i want you to explain to me why.

the answer can't be that the people who actually fought were convinced it was heroic. being an idiot or a sucker, or even responding comprehensibly to a situation about which you have been completely deceived, is not heroism. you are not a hero in virtue of the fact that your belief system has been manipulated by dick cheney, even if the situation is understandable, even if the truth is entirely unavailable. the most we could say for you at that point is that you, too, are a victim.

i'll thank you for your service if what you did was actually service, or if you should have my gratitude because you helped me in some way. if you just shot people on the other side of the world because someone told you to, then thanking you for your service is literally impossible. there was no service, and nothing for which to thank you.

service to your country (=your government) is admirable if your government is admirable. if not, not. memorial day rhetoric would make heroes out concentration camp guards, killing fields killers: anyone who "serves their country," i.e. destroys their own conscience and does what they tell you to do. connecting that to 'freedom' is beyond ironic; it's obscene.